kudos for Hostettler AND Pence to endorse McCain?

HoosierPundit resurrects an old and laudatory article about John Hostettler. Good stuff!

I hope he's elected Senator in November.

But this continues to beg the question: Can someone tell me why Mike Pence endorsed Dan Coats over Hostettler? And why would he endorse the baggage-laden, fiscally-moderate Mike Sodrel in the 9th District?

Will Pence follow that up by endorsing John McCain over J.D. Hayworth in Arizona (as Mitt Romney did this week)?

HoosierPundit on Coats' insider image/reality

HP responds to a Jim Shella comment and critiques the Coats campaign for its insider perception (and reality?).

Jim Shella: When Dan Coats filed his petitions to be on the ballot for U.S. Senate I asked him how he would deal with being labeled the “Washington Candidate” in this race. He responded by saying only, “We’re back in Indiana and we’re here to stay.” Today I received my first “Coats for Senate Morning Update.” It discusses an interview the former Senator did with a Washington publication (Human Events.) It attacked Democrat Brad Ellsworth by quoting two Washington blogs. It was sent to me by a public relations person in Washington, DC...

HoosierPundit: At some point, Dan Coats has to answer this. He promised that he would do so. And through all of the spin and covering by his myriad of newly-hired flacks, he still hasn't. Now it's just starting to get silly...

The other odd thing: Why on earth did Mike Pence attach himself to Coats and especially Mike Sodrel by endorsing them?

HoosierPundit on Young, Sodrel, Hankins, and "GOP leaders we can have confidence in"

From HoosierPundit, citing these (and other) excerpts from an article in the Indiana Daily Student:

“We cannot trade irresponsible Democrat leaders for Republican leaders we don’t have complete confidence in,” said Todd Young...It was a jab at former Rep. Mike Sodrel...

Young called the Republican-controlled Congress in which Sodrel served the most fiscally irresponsible, second only to the current one. But Young didn’t offer specifics about how he would have done better, just the usual talk about outrageous earmarks and bloated budgets.

Then, HP starts to critique Young and defend Sodrel.

So, let's hear it. Let's set aside the empty rhetoric about "outrageous earmarks and bloated budgets" and let's hear Todd Young's specifics.

I don't know about Young's speeches, but it's true that his website only provides modest detail. Then again, Sodrel's website provides none that I can find. That's probably best, since Mike sold himself as a fiscal conservative before he got to DC and then voted like a fiscal moderate. (See: the data from fiscal watchdog groups like NTU and Club for Growth. But I'm especially fascinated by the equivalence of Obama and Sodrel in 2006 by Citizens Against Government Waste!) I'd hate to see him start making more promises that just aren't credible-- without owning (and apologizing for) his voting record.

For those who value website specifics, they'll end up choosing the best candidate in the GOP field, Travis Hankins-- who has, by far, the most detailed description of his positions on his website.

HP ignores Hankins and attacks Young. A good strategy for a Sodrel supporter, I suppose...

Continuing on, HP also takes Young to task for critiquing the GOP Congress in which Sodrel served:

Young called the Republican-controlled Congress in which Sodrel served the most fiscally irresponsible, second only to the current one. Republican Congresses deserve a lot of criticism, particularly in light of the expansions of government they unwisely voted for in 2003 and 2004.

I'd also say that the Republican Congress that held office from 2005 to 2006...represented an attempt to begin a return back to the fiscal prudence seen by the Republican majority in the 1990s....

Some people are satisfied with the economics and spending of President Bush and the GOP Congress from 2005-2006 (and even 2001-2006). And many of those people will be quite content to vote for Sodrel. Unfortunately, those people cannot reasonably be called fiscal conservatives.

For those who want to choose a fiscal conservative in the 9th District GOP primary, you can have some/much faith in Todd Young-- and you can have as much confidence as one can imagine with Travis Hankins.

The Republicans in 2005 and 2006 were also trying, with their efforts at taking up Social Security reform in early 2005, to address looming entitlement problems....

Actually, this is one area where President Bush deserves credit-- one of the few areas in economic policy. Instead, it was the GOP Congress who sacked his efforts at reform. The GOP controlled the Presidency and the Congress and made no progress on entitlement reform-- or other issues like drilling for domestic oil or ending federal funding for Planned Parenthood.

Again, you may be content with that sort of thing. But you really shouldn't try to convince people that such things are "conservative" or impressive.

One last comment from HP:

So to attribute fiscal irresponsibility to be some Republican malady as Young does is to concede important facts, and a big area of the political battlefield, to assumptions and spin put forward by the Democrats...

I'd phrase it like this: To fail to attribute fiscal irresponsibility to the 2001-2006 Republicans "is to concede important facts, and a big area of the political battlefield, to assumptions and spin put forward by" those who want to return (or maintain?) the GOP ideological status quo of politically-expedient, big government. We cannot afford to go there...

Hanushek on the govt monopoly's education spending-- in Kentucky and three other states

An excerpt from Eric Hanushek's latest work (co-authored by Alfred Lindseth) in Eduational Choice...

A popular conception is that we have systematically shortchanged our children by failing to provide adequate schools. This view ignores the fact that government at all levels has poured hundreds of billions of dollars into the public education system, quadrupling per pupil spending since 1960. Even with such increases and the plethora of personnel, facilities and programs made possible by them, student achievement has languished....

Even in the face of this dismal record, politicians, parents and educators have been reluctant to change the framework through which education is delivered, especially when offering expanded choices to children outside traditional public schools. The courts have also been an important ally of the forces resisting change....

In our book, Schoolhouses, Courthouses, and Statehouses: Solving the Achievement-Funding Puzzle in America’s Public Schools, we examined the four states – Wyoming, Kentucky, New Jersey and Massachusetts – that have had the longest running and most expensive court-ordered adequacy remedies. We asked a simple question: Are these states performing significantly better on the NAEP tests, relative to other states, compared to before the additional funding commenced? In three of the four states, the answer was no. Only in Massachusetts, where the legislature also enacted a broad range of reforms including new accountability measures and more local autonomy, did the students improve their relative standing....

American asylum for German couple persecuted for home-schooling

Glorious/sad news from World...

A U.S. judge granted a German family political asylum after it fled its homeland because it was barred from homeschooling. Christians Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, who came to Tennessee in 2008 with their five children, said they faced religious persecution and the threat of fines and jail time for not complying with Germany's compulsory school attendance policy....

AA, NA-- and now, SA

From Michael Ramirez (hat tip: World)...

Kansas roadside junk sculpture

From Stephanie Simon in the WSJ...

The link allows you to see many of his creations!

Some folks keep journals. Others paste scrapbooks. M.T. Liggett records his life in junk...It's all memorialized in towering sculptures along Highway 400.

Mr. Liggett, who is 79 years old, constructs his carnival of memories from tractor gears, bowling balls, glass bottles, road signs, toilet seats, streetlights, coffee cans, wagon wheels and much more. The sculptures, hundreds of them, whirl and glint and rust in the prairie sun.

It is a startling sight to happen upon while driving through this placid three-block town, population 202. But that's how Kansas is....

Dude Perfect!

From Mark Bergin in World...

What began as six competitive college roommates inventing basketball shots in their backyard has grown to an international internet phenomenon. Dude Perfect, as they have dubbed their group, has drawn millions of YouTube viewers to their creative collection of amazing trick shots, including a super-long-distance bucket from the third deck of Texas A&M's Kyle Field to a portable basket positioned on the sidelines below.

Tyler Toney, otherwise known as "the bearded guy" on the Dude Perfect website, needed only about 70 tries to make the seemingly impossible shot. Incredibly, many of the other whacky buckets depicted in Dude Perfect videos took just one take...

"They've had the opportunity to talk about their faith," Jeff Toney said of the Aggie undergrads, all of whom are evangelical Christians and involved in promoting the foreign aid work of Compassion International....

innocent vs. deceitful sin

From Rebekah Curtis in Touchstone...

Our four kids are generally well-behaved, or so we're told. But occasionally they do something spectacularly disobedient, and more incredibly, they fail to make any serious effort to conceal it. This infuriates their father. If they're going to do something that [stupid], he growls, they should at least be clever enough to keep us from discovering them at their sin.

However, I salute their stupidity. I take it as a sign that though the children are disobedient, they have at least sinned simply and honestly. Their sin is impulsive, not deceptive; it is primarily of the flesh and not the devil. They sin with desire but without duplicity.

I know what she means in the second paragraph, but I would quibble with her word choice. The issue is ignorance, innocence and naivete, not stupidity. Sinful impulses are also quite problematic. But all in all, she makes a really interesting point.

Jesus tells us to be shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves. We should develop our cleverness but it must be applied with proper motives, with proper strength, and to proper ends. (Interestingly, the snake in Genesis 3 is described as crafty or cunning, but it's the same word that's more typically translated prudent in Proverbs.)

the importance of dinner table prayers and civility

I really liked this article-- food for thought, so to speak-- and shared with my wife and kids immediately after reading it.

From Patrick Henry Reardon in Touchstone (hat tip: Bona Vita who saved me a lot of typing)...

1. First, a person learns to pray at table, to thank God for his blessings, some of which the family shares at mealtime. He thus acquires the habit of gratitude, which is essential to a soul pleasing to God.
2. Second, because he has just thanked God for his food, a person cannot logically complain of it. This would contradict the prayer of thanksgiving...
3. Third, a person learns elementary self-control....
4. Fourth, at the family table a person becomes versed in the formalities of speech common in a polite society. Under the gentle dicipline of his elders, he acquires the ability to communicate with others kindly, a trait also vital to the contouring of character.

recession, unemployment and divorce

From Susan Olasky in World... who opens with a quote from Christian sociology prof, Brad Wilcox:

"The recession reminds us that marriage is more than an emotional relationship; marriage is also an economic partnership and social safety net....There is nothing like the loss of a job, an imminent foreclosure, or a shrinking 401(k) to gain new appreciation for a wife's job, a husband's commitment to pay down debt, or the in-laws' willingness to help out with childcare or a rent-free place to live."

From there, she analyzes the impact of the current recession on marriage:

A decline in the divorce rate last year shows that the recession has not caused a stampede toward divorce court, but the decline may be temporary as couples wait for housing prices to rebound before getting divorced. One positive note: Credit card debt is down. Couples are more likely to stay together when they have more shared assets and fewer debts....

This recession...has thrown more working-class and poor men out of work, and Wilcox's research suggests that this could have troubling long-term effects...

statist vs. market versions of Black History Month

From Marvin Olasky in World...

Oscar Stanton De Priest (1871-1951) was the first African-American elected to Congress in the 20th century. Like Barack Obama, he rose through Chicago machine politics. Unlike Obama, De Priest was a Republican firmly opposed to big government....

Schoolroom and media accounts during February's Black History Month celebrate big-government proponents but generally ignore fighters for individual liberty like De Priest, NAACP co-founder Moorfield Storey, Howard University dean Kelly Miller, and novelist Zora Neale Hurston....

Jonathan Bean's Race & Liberty in America points out that "academic booklists reflect the politically correct view that left-wing liberals or radicals completely dominated the struggle for racial freedom." Bean's excellent book shows that many African-American leaders in the 19th and 20th centuries had a different emphasis. Those leaders prized individual rights, Christianity, and markets where the only color is the green of greenbacks. Those leaders knew that government power enforced racist codes and segregation...

Sounds like a book to check out!

Apple goes all Microsoft on the market....

Apple is deciding that it is cool to follow in Microsoft's footsteps...what irony!

From Holman Jenkins in the WSJ...

Don't look now but this may be the year when Apple's market cap does the unthinkable and surpasses Microsoft's. Congratulations will be in order but so will condolences. For a company preoccupied with products is in danger of becoming a company preoccupied with strategy. And by "strategy," we mean zero-sum maneuvering versus hated rivals....

The iPad may not be the best Web-browsing machine simply because Apple refuses to support Flash, which delivers 75% of the video on the Web....let's not mince words: The iPad looks like a device optimized to patronize the iTunes store....

And what about Apple's decision to exclude Flash? Apple and its supporters stake out aesthetic and philosophical grounds...Uh huh. Flash would also allow iPhone and iPad users to consume video and other entertainment without going through iTunes....

Steve Jobs, that Apple is perfectly within its rights to do so. But the thing to notice is that Apple is making a strategic choice to cut off its users from a huge amount of Web content....

Here's the bigger worry. Apple may be succumbing to the seductive temptations of "network effects," in which the all-consuming goal becomes getting its mobile devices into more and more hands simply for the purpose of locking more and more users into iTunes....

Network effects can be a path to power and riches, but (as Microsoft has shown) much of the proceeds can also end up being squandered on defensive and paranoid attempts to secure the privileged position....

charity can't feed the poor; hairstylists can't shave; and leave your snow globes at home

Three beauties from Charles Oliver's "Brickbat" section in Reason...

1.) The Bowery Mission in New York City had to toss away a batch of fried chicken donated by a local church to help feed the homeless. City law bans all licensed food vendors, including emergency food providers, from serving food with trans fat.

2.) The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation has fined the Roosters salon chain for allowing its cosmetologists to shave their customers. Texas law allows only barbers to shave.

3.) The Transportation Security Administration will not allow airline passengers to take snow globes through security. The globes contain liquids, and the agency's rules bar passengers from bringing liquids, gels, or aerosols in containers of more than three ounces in their carry-on bags.

Arpaio's fascism lite

Here's a shorter version of the video (pasted in below)-- and the full version (start watching at about 1:00)...

From Radley Balko in Reason...

It's right there on video: On October 19 in a Maricopa County, Arizona, courtroom, as defense attorney Joanne Cuccia discusses her client's sentencing with Superior Court Judge Lisa Flores, court deputy Adam Stoddard walks up behind her and begins sifting through a file on her desk. He eventually removes a document, reads it, then hands it to another deputy for copying.

Cuccia's client witnessed this snooping, which was brought to the attention of Judge Flores. The Phoenix-based freelance journalist Nick Martin then acquired the video and posted it online.

At a subsequent hearing on the incident, Superior Court Judge Gary Donahoe ordered deputy Stoddard to apologize at a press conference for the violation of attorney-client privilege. But Stoddard works for the famed Joe Arpaio, self-described "toughest sheriff in America," and Donahoe's order set off a surreal clash between the state's courts and Arpaio's department.

Stoddard refused to apologize and instead went to jail, where he is enjoying paid leave. Arpaio...called Stoddard a "political prisoner." The day after Stoddard was locked up, 20 of his fellow deputies called in sick, resulting in delays in the county court system. The court building was evacuated after a bomb threat, at which point several police unions coincidentally held a "Free Stoddard" rally in front of the evacuated crowd....

govt monopoly serves mystery meat in schools

From Katherine Mangu-Ward in Reason...

Fast food restaurants are reputed to be cut-rate, unhealthy outfits, while government-run schools are supposed to be public-spirited and socially responsible. But according to a USA Today investigation published in December, meat that would be rejected by McDonald's and Jack-in-the-Box is being served to American schoolchildren.

School meat is tested less often than restaurant meat and for fewer contaminants. With ground beef, for example, fast food joints typically pull samples for testing from the line every 15 minutes and test composite samples every hour or two. The Agricultural Marketing Service, the wing of the U.S. Department of Agriculture that buys meat for schools, pulls samples just eight times a day, and it combines them into a single daily test.

Why the difference? For one thing, fast food companies have more at stake....leaving the mystery meat to the schools.

remember the eminent domain Supreme Court case....here's how it turned out economically

This is the sort of judicial activism that many conservatives applauded...

Here's the ironic, moronic latest-- from Damon Root in Reason...

IN 1998 THE pharmaceutical company Pfizer announced plans to build a giant new research and development center in New London, Connecticut. As part of the deal, city officials agreed to clear out neighboring property owners via eminent domain, giving a private developer space to build a fancy new hotel, apartment buildings, and office towers to complement the Pfizer facility. Seven years later, in Kelo v. City of New London, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld this seizure of private property because it was part of a "comprehensive redevelopment plan" that would provide "appreciable benefits to the community."

So how did that work out? The project that was used to entice Pfizer was never built, and in November the company announced that it was closing down its facility and pulling out of New London...

tire reefs: with govt and the environment, you should always worry about theory vs. practice!

From in USAToday (hat tip: C-J)...

A mile offshore from this city's high-rise condos and spring-break bars lie as many as 2 million old tires, strewn across the ocean floor — a white-walled, steel-belted monument to good intentions gone awry.

The tires were unloaded there in 1972 to create an artificial reef that could attract a rich variety of marine life, and to free up space in clogged landfills. But decades later, the idea has proved a huge ecological blunder.

Little sea life has formed on the tires. Some of the tires that were bundled together with nylon and steel have broken loose and are scouring the ocean floor across a swath the size of 31 football fields. Tires are washing up on beaches. Thousands have wedged up against a nearby natural reef, blocking coral growth and devastating marine life....similar problems have been reported at tire reefs worldwide....

Gov. Charlie Crist's proposed budget includes $2 million to help gather up and remove the tires. The military divers would do their share of the work at no cost to the state by making it part of their training...A month-long pilot project is set for June. The full-scale salvage operation is expected to run through 2010 at a cost to the state of about $3.4 million...

"these devices are useful as signals that the president is about to mislead us"

Jacob Sullum in Reason-- again, a Libertarian not a partisan Republican-- absolutely crushing President Obama...

“There are those who claim we have to choose between paying down our deficits…and investing in job creation and economic growth,” President Obama said last week. “This is a false choice.” During the same speech, he asked his audience to “let me just be clear” that his administration, having racked up the biggest budget deficits ever, is embracing fiscal responsibility, as reflected in his vow that “health insurance reform” will not increase the deficit “by one dime.”

For connoisseurs of Obama-speak, the address featured a trifecta, combining three of his favorite rhetorical tropes. There was the vague reference to “those who” question his agenda, the “false choice” they use to deceive the public, and the determination to “be clear” and forthright, in contrast with those dishonest naysayers. These devices are useful as signals that the president is about to mislead us.

BOOM...OUCH!

Obama says his opponents wrongly insist that we choose between “paying down our deficits” and “investing in job creation and economic growth.” But that is not the way his real critics, as opposed to the imaginary, nameless ones who appear in his speeches, would frame the issue....

Here are some other things Obama has asked us to let him be clear about: “Earmarks have given legislators the opportunity to direct federal money to worthy projects”; the U.S. government “has no interest in running GM”; Medicare cuts will be made “in a way that protects our senior citizens” from changes in benefits or costs; and a “public option” for health care, which would invite businesses to offload their medical costs onto taxpayers and could drive private insurers from the market, “would not impact those of you who already have insurance.” From now on, when you hear Obama speak, try replacing “let me be clear” with “let me lie to you,” and see if it makes more sense....

Obama’s depiction of his critics is a bit further removed from reality....In Obama’s world...we have his bold yet achievable plan, pitted against socialist utopianism and blind partisan intransigence. Let me be clear: This is a false choice.

how is Obama's diplomacy working?

From Matt Welch at Reason-- a libertarian not a Republican...

In just about every speech at their 2008 convention, Democrats promised voters that a change in the White House would, in Barack Obama’s formulation, restore “our moral standing” in the world. Replace the unilateralist cowboy at the top with a humbler multilateralist, and the path would finally be cleared to fix vexing international issues such as curbing carbon emissions and dealing with the mullahs in Iran. Like many of the party faithful’s long-nurtured beliefs, this hope has disintegrated on contact with reality.

...especially in the wake of the climate conference debacle in Copenhagen. It’s not just that the less confrontational American president has been unable to deliver results. He can’t even get his phone calls returned.

Welch then relates this sad/amazing story:

“On the last day of the [Copenhagen] talks, the Americans tried to fix up one-to-one meetings between Mr Obama and the leaders of South Africa, Brazil and India—but failed each time,” Gideon Rachman wrote in the Financial Times piece. “The Indians even said that their prime minister, Manmohan Singh, had already left for the airport. So Mr Obama must have felt something of a chump when he arrived for a last-minute meeting with Wen Jiabao, the Chinese prime minister, only to find him already deep in negotiations with the leaders of none other than Brazil, South Africa and India.”...

Obama’s approach was supposed to produce a more cooperative Tehran and Moscow, fewer terrorists in the Muslim world, and vast new initiatives to fight global poverty. Instead...

These developments illustrate a phenomenon that has been playing out across a variety of public policy areas: Progressive Democrats, after being outfoxed by Ronald Reagan, triangulated to the policy margins by Bill Clinton, then routed under the first six years of George W. Bush, are having many of the nostrums they championed during the wilderness years tested in the real world for the first time in decades. The initial results of this long-delayed peer review have been a shock to the progressive system....

Welch finishes by poking at the increase in lobbying under Obama. He doesn't mention Obama's hypocrisy with transparency.

they almost always underestimate the direct cost of government programs

And that's not to mention the routinely-unanticipated indirect costs!

Here's a nice piece from Veronique de Rugy in Reason...

Congress says that the health care package it passed at the end of 2009 will cost roughly $900 billion over 10 years—and will somehow end up saving taxpayers money in the long run. If you think that sounds unlikely, you’re right.

With the federal government, massive cost overruns are the rule, not the exception. The $700 billion cost of the war in Iraq dwarfs the $50 billion to $60 billion that Mitch Daniels, then director of the Office of Management and Budget, predicted at the outset. In 1967 long-run forecasts estimated that Medicare would cost about $12 billion by 1990. In reality, it cost more than $98 billion that year. Today it costs $500 billion.

Nor is the problem limited to Washington. In 2002 the Journal of the American Planning Association published one of the most comprehensive studies of cost overruns, looking over the last 70 years at 258 government projects around the world with a combined value of $90 billion. The Danish economists Bent Flyvbjerg, Mette Skamris Holm, and Soren Buhl found that nine out of 10 public works projects had exceeded their initially estimated costs....Budget busting occurred throughout the seven decades studied, with the totals spent routinely ranging from 50 to 100 percent more than the original estimate.

How did the United States do? According to the Danish researchers, American cost overruns reached an average of $55 billion per year....The military, too, has a long history of cost overruns....

Strangely, lawmakers never seem to anticipate these extra costs even when the excesses take place under their noses. The Capitol Hill Visitor Center, an ambitious three-floor underground facility originally scheduled to open at the end of 2005, was delayed until 2008. The price tag leaped from an estimate of $265 million in 2000 to a final cost of $621 million....

stimulus plans A, B and now....C!

The WSJ editorialists comparing Obama's jobs tax credit proposal to Jimmy Carter's...ouch!

Stimulus Plan A didn't work to create jobs or reduce unemployment. That was the $165 billion of tax rebates and money for states in February 2008.

Plan B flopped too. That was last February's stimulus that has devoted $862 billion into mostly government programs....

Now comes Plan C, another February stimulus, though this time everyone has been instructed not to use the "s word," lest it scare the voters. This one is a "jobs bill," as if Plans A and B were about something else. Don't expect this one to work any better than the last two....

This latest Senate Democratic bill will cost $85 billion and is shaping up to be largely a rehash of last year's stimulus: extended unemployment insurance, Medicaid cash for the states, and some public works spending. The one new twist is a proposal for a one-year $5,000 tax credit for small businesses for each new worker hired...

But we've also seen this economic movie before—in 1977 under Jimmy Carter. During the two years it was in effect, a jobs credit worth about $7,000 in today's dollars became a $20 billion free lunch as businesses claimed the handout for one of every three new employees.

In the short term, the Jimmy Carter jobs credit appeared to reduce unemployment. The jobless rate dropped by 1.2 percentage points (to 5.8% in 1979 from 7% in 1977). But that effect was short-lived, and when the subsidies ended two years later the layoffs resumed and the unemployment rate rose again and by 1980 was back to 7.2%...

another jobs bill = an even longer recession...thanks!

From the AP's Stephen Ohlemacher (hat tip: C-J)...

It sounds great: A big jobs bill that would hand President Barack Obama a badly needed victory and please Republicans with tax cuts at the same time. But there's a problem: It won't actually create many jobs.

Even the Obama administration acknowledges the legislation's centerpiece — a tax cut for businesses that hire unemployed workers — would work only on the margins.

Senate Democrats are working this week to round up Republican support for the bill, which would exempt businesses from paying Social Security payroll taxes on new employees hired this year, as long as the workers had been unemployed at least 60 days. The tax break is a simpler, less expensive alternative to Obama's proposed tax cut of up to $5,000 for each new worker that employers hire...

Passage would give Obama the first tangible accomplishment of his renewed focus on job creation, which is also an important election year issue for Congress, with unemployment just below 10 percent. Senate Republicans are willing partners because the bill is filled with tax breaks they support.

But tax experts and business leaders said companies are unlikely to hire workers just to receive a tax break. Before businesses start hiring, they need increased demand for their products, more work for their employees and more revenue to pay those workers....

The Senate proposal is estimated to cost about $10 billion, which would add 80,000 to 180,000 jobs over the course of a year. The U.S. economy, meanwhile, has lost 8.4 million jobs since the start of the recession...

A lot of bad stuff comes out of this article:

-The Senate GOP continues to be a mess.

-Look how expensive (and temporary) the created jobs are-- even ignoring the impact on the debt, interest rates, etc.

-How cynical or stupid politicians are &/or how stupid we are if we applaud this.

-How this is not going to work-- and will only continue to delay our recovery. Thanks Bush/Obama/Congress for extending our country's woes to 26 months and counting...

2009 health care profit-- and the unhealthy stink about it

From Patrick Howington and Laura Ungar in the C-J...

Despite a struggling economy, the nation's five largest health insurance companies increased their profits by a combined 56 percent last year, to $12.2 billion, even as they lost nearly 2 million members.

But as Congress considers health care reforms, those profits and Anthem's premium increases of up to 39 percent for some California members have intensified criticism of the industry....

Industry spokesmen said it's unfair to simply compare 2009 profits with the year before, when the recession was at its worst....

Insurers also said while their 2009 profit gains in raw dollars might seem large, their margin of profit is modest compared to many other industries, including others in the health care sector.

They noted that Fortune magazine's list of the 53 most profitable industries placed health insurance and managed care at No. 35, based on 2008 profits that were 2.2 percent of revenue. That compared with, for example, 19.3 cents profit on each dollar of revenue for pharmaceutical companies and an 8.7 percent profit margin for gas and electric utilities...

If you want to assert and then work to reduce artificially high profits, then you do that by increasing competition. Arguably, the government looks to provide competition, but it is subsidized and thus, could easily be abused. Moreover, there are easier ways to increase competition by decreasing labor and insurance market regulations.

If you want to reduce prices beyond that, you must lower to costs to those providing the service. Current reform efforts only exacerbate this problem.

one man's child porn is another man's education

The art fan just happens to sell himself as more sophisticated. A similar thing happens in comparing various forms of entertainment-- from casinos to the opera.

Here's Roger Alford in the C-J on child pornography to be displayed at U of L as science and education.

A family advocacy group objects to a photographic exhibit of nude women and girls planned for display at the University of Louisville this week as part of a health program...the Century Project, which consists of more than 100 nude photographs by Wyoming photographer Frank Cordelle....

“It's one thing to promote the beauty of the human body,” Ostrander said. “It's another thing to exhibit fully nude photographs of children who are not able to legally consent to such things. These are the kind of photographs that get people sent to jail.”

Cordelle said he has exhibited the photos at colleges and universities at least 65 times, including three previous times in Kentucky, largely without controversy. The University of North Carolina-Wilmington ordered the nude photos of children removed from the exhibit when it was displayed there last year.

Both Cordelle and the University of Louisville defended the exhibit, saying it promotes a healthy body image among girls and women. Even so, they defended the rights of critics to express their views....

a Bible course in KY schools?

From the C-J editorialists...

Plenty of serious concerns already existed about Sen. David Boswell's bill to teach the Bible as an elective course in public schools...Briefly, the measure (SB 142) sets up guidelines on how to teach a class on the Bible and its many influences throughout the arts, history, cultures and mores. It also contains language that establishes the course must follow state and federal laws about religious neutrality. On its face, that sounds reasonable. But the rub on religion is that the discussion surrounding it very often turns unreasonable — and intolerant.

Seems to border on paranoid so far, but overall, reasonably balanced...

There was so much wrong with what the lawmakers said, and how they reacted to its passage, that it almost served as a blueprint to why religion correctly belongs in houses of worship and not the public school classroom...

From there, they provide some troubling examples.

The mere fact that the proposed class only includes the Bible, and not the literary teachings of other holy books and religions, smacks of exclusivity and of promotion of one set of religious beliefs, and that is offensive to individuals of other religions (or no religion) and to the notion of a pluralistic society. Whether the course offered is an elective or not is immaterial.

Hmmm..."smacks of", maybe. But a lot of worry about pluralism? No. The C-J's version of pluralism seems to be we don't talk about such things-- at least if it's the majority view. And of course it matters whether it's an elective or not!

All this said, the larger issues to me are...

As an economist, why don't we allow choice in schools. Then we avoid the tyranny of the majority, the tyranny of the minority, and most relevant, the tyranny of the monopoly?

As a Christian, why would a Christian push to have nominal/cultural Christians teaching (their?) kids about the Bible?

the warning lights

A fine sermon from Kyle on Sunday-- on a pressing topic: how do we respond to the "warning lights" in our life? The key text was Eli's failures as a parent/priest in I Sam 2-3. Brutal and sobering stuff...

A few highlights:

-The enemies of the warning lights: procrastination (later), denial (it's not that big of a deal), and despair (it's too late).

-Kyle messed with the popular phrase-- "you have to hit rock bottom"-- by saying "No, you don't"!

-On "too late", in a sense, it is too late; consequences still come. But God is in the redemption business. Kyle quoted Rom 8:28 here. But I'm always reminded me of the end of Samson's story-- and my mom's second husband (who converted near the end of his life, worried about it coming too late, and God doing some miraculous things through him-- phyiscally and otherwise-- in his last few weeks).

-Toward the end, he had some very interesting observations on Tiger's apology speech the preceding Friday.

on the 1st anniversary of Libertarian representation on the Indy City Council

From "(Paul) Ogden on Politics" about Ed Coleman...

It was just a year ago yesterday that at-large Republican Indianapolis City-County Councilor Ed Coleman announced he was leaving the Republican Party to join the Libertarians. I attended the poorly-attended press conference that day. Although...a major victory for the Libertarians, the media didn't seem to notice.

While the Coleman announcement fell flat, the following months into Coleman's tenure offered opportunities for the Marion County Libertarian Party to make news as the loyal opposition to big government, a position that the Republicans had abdicated in favor of supporting Mayor Greg Ballard who, post-election, fell in love with corporate welfare and tax increases....

Libertarians pointed out the unenforceability of the panhandling ordinance and how, as written, it could be used to go after political speech....

Then you had the Libertarian Party's opposition to the comprehensive smoking ban proposal, which nanny-state measure was unbelievably introduced by a Republican...

Libertarian Coleman introduced a measure to allowing guns to be taken into city parks, just as guns are allowed into state and national parks. Mayor Ballard blew a gasket and immediately threatened a veto...while many Republican councilors behind the scenes laud Coleman for being right on the gun issue and quietly express support, few are willing to make the case forcefully that the Mayor is wrong and Coleman is right....

Coleman has also introduced successful measures putting city contracts on-line and providing spaces for motorcycle parking downtown....

Can Maguire and Coleman turn this new-found media attention on the Libertarian Party into votes? That will be an extraordinarily steep mountain to climb....

We shall see what the next year brings Ed Coleman and the Marion County Libertarian Party. Although armed with only a fraction of the vote, Libertarians have drawn considerable attention of the media which is looking for individuals who will offer the small government, fiscally conservative arguments local Republicans used to make, although not always sincerely so. At worst, Libertarians may end up forcing Republicans to live up to their campaign promises about small government and the role of government. As a Republican, I think that would indeed be a very good thing.

UNC basketball and not-so-happy meals

Eric Crawford gets off two nice lines in an essay on the struggles of the UNC basketball program this year. (For some reason, it's not on-line at this point, so I don't have a link.)

In talking about UNC's seven McDonald's All-Americans...

...it's hard to believe that all those McDonald's All-Americans would not add up to a Happy Meal.

...may rate as McDonald's biggest 'fail' since the McLean Deluxe.

"eats like a pterodactyl"

Exchange "she" for "he"-- and this is our second son (including the red hair)...

He's thin, eats like a bird and likes to make pterodactyl noises.
Thanks to Dave Coverley's Speed Bump, it's all making sense now!

Genesis 2:18-25's naked and suitable helper

In Genesis 2:19-20, Adam names the animals. Of course, we know that Adam couldn't have evolved from apes, because he would have recognized his Mom & Dad when he was naming the animals. To revisit some familiar themes: Adam is involved with God’s creation; he is exercising free will, modest levels of dominion, and his budding powers of discernment (not forbidden knowledge).

This is the first (reported) use of language (although the words unreported). Again, Adam is bringing order to creation (in the image of God). And, so to speak, he is “making his own world”—the first human “invention”. As Kass observes: “Human naming, while it does not create the world, creates a linguistic world, a second world, of names, that mirrors the first world of creatures.”

The animal-naming parenthesis is bracketed by Gen 2:18a's "not good for man to be alone" and Gen 2:20b’s “no suitable helper”. Adam is “alone” vs. all other animals with ‘their kind’ (1:24-25).

He is also “alone” vs. the presence of God. We often assume that God would have been “enough”, but it’s God’s testimony that Adam is alone and this is “not good”. Puttnig it another way, even though Adam had walked with God, he needed Eve to complete him. We need relations with both God and man—vertical and horizontal; if only one or the other, it’s “not good”

Why was it not good for Adam to be “alone”? Solitude is an oft-overlooked good—and at least externally, requires being “alone”. There are two possibilities. First, Adam may have been insufficient, implying a weakness. Kass: “lacking a suitable mirror, might be incapable of self-knowledge”. But Kass also notes that aloneness can invite the illusion of self-sufficiency—a mark of real or imagined strength. If so, the remedy is weakening by division, opposition, conflict—still a “help”, but in a different way! We see both angles in play within marriage.

Kass continues this line of thinking by wrestling with the Hebrew phrase ezer kenegdo. First, ezer often refers to God! Second, it can be defined as a helper “corresponding to”—OR “opposite, over against, in front of”—him. (Kass proposes the term “counterpart” as “fitting and suitable to be sure, but also opposed”.)

In Genesis 2:21, we see God as the first anesthesiologist and surgeon. And he uses a rib—lit. “part of the man’s side”. Two interesting analogies here: selal is almost always used to denote “side(s)” of the Tabernacle, temple or Ezekiel’s temple; and as the Church was born in a sense from out of Christ’s side/wound.

It’s also interesting that God didn’t create Eve with Dust II—the sequel. Note the intimacy of the chosen body part. You’ll hear Matthew Henry quoted but not credited at many weddings on this: "The woman was made out of a rib out of the side of Adam; not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved."

Note also that after surgery, Adam is no longer “whole” individually—but ironically, more of a whole together and thus, in a sense, individually!

In Genesis 2:23, we read the Bible’s first recorded words. Of course, there’s no need to speak—or at least, to record it—until someone else shows up! Adam is, reasonably, much more interested in these events. The NIV masks this by opening up with “this is now” rather than “this one at last”, with its implied emotion, length of time—as if an answer to prayer. Kass notes that “The man reacts to the woman’s appearance, as have billions of men down to the present day…” And he does a nice job—with poetry and a love song.

He names the woman ishah and then renames himself ish. He names himself in relation to the woman, acknowledging her otherness, but focusing on her sameness. This is almost certainly sexually charged—from the language and the context (24’s “one flesh”). As Kass argues, “This should not surprise us: no worthy account of…human nature would fail to give sexual desire a central place…”

Gen 2:24 also describe the new family unit and establishes the divine plan for inseparable monogamy (Mal 2:13-16a)—a passage cited by Jesus and Paul in discussing God's will for sex and marriage. The text also points to two of the key problems in marriage—a failure to leave or cleave—especially for younger couples. Interestingly, they are called to be separate/distinct from parents, even without parents in their picture yet!

The phrase “become one flesh” is loaded—from the one-time, first-time event of sex, to the on-going event of sex, to the on-going process of coming together as a couple (partners in body, mind, soul and spirit).

Gen 2:25’s “naked” speaks to their relation with God and each other—no sin, no separation; vertical and horizontal; loving God and others; emotional, physical, and spiritual intimacy. And “they felt no shame”—a picture of innocence, akin to kids running around naked, deer in animal refuges, and hopefully sex/nakedness with one’s marriage partner.

To close, two questions: First, Kass wrestles with whether this a “man-centered” narrative. He says yes—at first blush. Man is created first and woman is derived from (and dependent on) man. But they are also co-equal (in 1:26-28). Beyond that, man’s origin is lower (dust vs. living flesh—and that, from near the heart!); and man only understands himself and is complete when the woman shows up.

Second, in The Genesis of Perfection, Anderson wrestles at length with Jewish and early Christian tradition on when and where Adam & Eve first had sex (and why it can matter theologically). Here, I want to focus on his conclusion that we are generally called to marriage (and then, sex within marriage), but we are also occasionally called to transcend our sexual nature in special cases. In the OT, there are times when Israel was called to ritual cleanness for consecration/dedication (Ex 19:15, Josh 3:5). In the NT, we have I Cor 7 and the example of Jesus.

Anderson notes: “a theological paradox that is at the very heart of the Bible’s teaching about sexuality…we are both anthropos and theos, part human, part divine. On the one hand, sexuality is at the very center of what it means to be human…On the other hand, our vocation as persons often follows a quite different trajectory…we are commanded from time to time to draw near to him…[to] renounce our sexual nature in order to enter his sacred space…We are both sexual beings and beings who can transcend our sexual selves.”

Anderson continues by noting the two errors in exaggerate either aspect of this balance—focusing on ourselves as sexual beings or relegating sex to something dirty.

Genesis 2:5-17's dust, "breath of life", and all of those trees

Genesis 2:5c’s “to work/till the ground” is avad, meaning to work and to serve—and related to the word eved meaning servant or slave. Kass observes “even before we meet him, man is defined by his work: less the ruler over life, more the servant of the earth”.

In Genesis 2:7, God is pictured as a potter, taking great care with his creation of man. The term for man here is Adam, related to adamah, meaning ground. (He is not named “Adam” until 2:20.)

Genesis 2:7 also tells that man is made from dust—something which is formless (a la Gen 1:2), so dry (w/ app. to spiritual matters and the springs of living waters), so common (frequent)—and so common (vulgar). Matthew Henry observes: something "despicable...a very unlikely thing to make a man of; but the same infinite power that made the world (out) of nothing, made man (out) of next to nothing." God condescended to make something in His image—out of dirt!

Dust—and God’s "breath of life". The combo speaks to some big realities: we are physical and spiritual, earthly and divine, natural and supernatural. It speaks to our need for humility: God created us, out of dust, and we require His breath. Matthew Henry applies this: "Let the soul which God has breathed into us breathe after him." And Kass observes: “Human troubles are foreshadowed by man’s dual origins: he is constituted by two principles, the first one low, the second one high…Higher than the earth, yet still bound to it.”

Genesis 2:8 says God put Adam in a garden, implying the usefulness of work (our participation) within God’s provision—vs. just picking fruit/nuts—a picture of growth, cultivation, and then fruit.

In Genesis 2:9, we learn about the trees. First, "all kinds of trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food". God's good gifts and plentiful provision here includes beauty, usefulness, and variety/extravagance. Two special trees are singled out—the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (more later) and “the tree of life” which signifies or sustains life (whether figurative or nutritional).

In Genesis 2:15, Adam is again “put” (2:8)—this time, he is invited to help God continue His work (Eph 2:10)—“to work and take care of” Eden. For all of the talk about the first “institution” in the Bible (marriage), Kingdom work precedes it in importance. Note also that work is pre-Fall, so it was meant to be a blessing pre-Fall and is meant to be a redeemed blessing post-Fall. Adam is to “work the soil”—something that is congruent with who we are and what we’re made of.

Genesis 2:16 lays out God’s bounty while Genesis 2:17 lays out prohibition and penalty. 2:16 starts with “commanded…you are free”—a very interesting combo! As is common in Scripture, we are given resources first and then responsibilities. (See: Eph 1-3 vs. 4-6.) But this combo also points to defining freedom in light of necessity/constraint and responsibility (Acton). We are human—and thus, face permission and prohibition, opportunities and limits.

Aside from disobedience, the problem of this knowledge is undefined. Adam and Eve already possessed some moral discernment and knew God's general will for them—and they were called to pursue other sorts of knowledge (e.g., ordering the world by naming the animals). Presumably, this is additional/prohibitive moral knowledge or ethical discernment (Dt 1:39, Is 7:15), something akin to the figurative death/loss of a child’s innocence.

Broder on Bayh (and why it's far better to be a governor)

David Broder of the WaPo in JewishWorldReview...

The last time Sen. Evan Bayh was the subject of this column was in October, when he organized a letter from 10 moderate Democrats informing Majority Leader Harry Reid that they would oppose any increase in the statutory debt ceiling unless it was accompanied by a serious move to rein in the national debt.

Specifically, the Indiana Democrat and his colleagues asked for a vote on the proposal to create a bipartisan commission to examine all aspects of spending and taxation and recommend deficit-cutting steps for a guaranteed vote by the House and Senate by the end of this year.

The Bayh threat worked. President Obama, who had been silent on the subject, belatedly gave the action-forcing commission his blessing, and Reid called it up for a Senate vote. But despite winning a 53-to-46 majority, it fell short of the 60-vote margin needed to avoid a filibuster.

This was the final straw...Both parties were to blame, he said. Twenty-three Republicans (and one independent) voted no, seven of them people who had previously co-sponsored the commission bill. So did 22 Democrats, many of them committee chairmen looking out for their own prerogatives.

I cannot fault Bayh for leaving, nor can I disagree with his statement that "short-term political advantage" trumped the national interest in this case and in many others in this sorry excuse for a Congress.

He is not alone in turning his back on the Senate. Eleven incumbents have announced their retirements -- an unusually large crop. Three other retirees -- Republicans Christopher "Kit" Bond of Missouri, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire and George Voinovich of Ohio -- are, like Bayh, former governors of their states. A fifth retiree, Sam Brownback of Kansas, is leaving to run for governor...

This observation about (former) governors is most interesting. It also points to some/much of Obama's struggle-- and why the country has been (wisely) reluctant to allow Senators (or Reps) to be President.

Mellencamp for U.S. Senate?

There's an effort on Facebook to draft/promote JCM.

John did some fine work with FarmAid. I wish he'd do something about farm subsidies...

Click here for access to an amazing database!

a great example of subtle vs. obvious costs

And the government's incentive to embrace subtlety and to avoid the obvious...

From R.T. Rybak, mayor of Minneapolis (hat tip: C-J)...

"A snowfall done well has very little political upside. A snowfall done poorly can be the worst thing for a mayor."

Toyota vs. the govt?

From Marc Murphy in the C-J...

This situation is made even more difficult-- at least in terms of perception-- by government's ties to GM and Chrysler. They have a vested interest-- at least more than they should-- in messing over Toyota.

JCPS reduces (subsidized) preschool offerings

From the C-J editorialists...

It has long been recognized that it is important for young children to get a jump start on their formal educations.

Education? Yes. "Formal"? No.

Preschools are particularly important to disadvantaged children, so taxpayers underwrite the costs of public preschools for low-income and special needs children. Middle-class families, meanwhile, traditionally have been able to afford tuition-based, but nevertheless partially subsidized preschools.

The key questions: Why is the subsidy given to schools rather than parents and children? Why use a subsidy that sets up monopoly power rather than fostering competition? Why not use a subsidy that would result in higher quality and lower costs?

Enrollments in those programs dropped from 482 last year to 303 this year, and the district reports having lost $283,644 last year, even though tuitions were raised from $115 per week per child to $140.

A number of observations from the numbers here:

-It's interesting that prices were increased by so much.

-Holding other things constant (not appropriate to the extent that the economy got worse last year), demand was elastic. In other words, the percentage change in quantity was even more than the percentage change in price, resulting in (substantially) declining revenues.

-If the schools meet for 36 weeks (180 days), the loss in revenue would be $468,360. This would, presumably, be offset by even greater reduced costs.

Sarah's Choice

The movie will be shown at IUS on Saturday, February 20th at 7:00.

Tickets are $7 and proceeds will support PURE.

Contact Shari at Choices for Women (941-0872) for more info.

what does Jimmy Carter have in common with Ozzy Osbourne?

I often give President Carter a hard time as one of our worst presidents.

But he and Ozzy deserve kudos for this-- their marriages, especially in a time when marriage has been diminished by a casual approach to what should be sacred.

Here's Elizabeth Bernstein in the WSJ...

For Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne, it's perseverance. For Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter, it's maintaining separate work lives....

OK, maybe it wasn't always bliss. But each of them has stayed married—to the same person—for a very long time. And each considers his or her marriage to be happy, strong and mutually supportive. In other words, they beat the odds....

James Cordova, a psychologist at Clark University, advises couples not to leave it to chance. You should assess your marriage at least once a year, he says. "Imagine going to the dentist only if your tooth actually hurt. At that point something has gone terribly wrong, and the odds of saving it go way down," says Dr. Cordova, author of "The Marriage Checkup." "Marriage is the same."

Of course, no one ever said that every day, or even every year, was going to be rosy. And there are plenty of long marriages that are unhappy. But there are some strategies that happily married couples say work:

• Find the middle ground.

• Be funny.

• Keep (some) secrets.

• Never, ever give up.

Baron Hill's crack addiction

Well, that's the only way I can figure out how he can claim that he's a fiscal conservative.

I just got a taxpayer-financed mailing from Baron this week, proclaiming that he is "standing up against wasteful spending in Washington" and "working to restore fiscal responsibility in Washington".

As always, it's worth noting that Hill is good on fiscal matters-- for a Democrat. But that's not worth much. But to claim that he's taking some bold stand while his party and his president (the one he endorsed) are running up crazy deficits? Are you kidding me?

The man is either deluded, a liar, or needs to step outsider and throw his crack pipe as far away as possible.

how and why Lent...

Christianity Today hosted three authors for comments on why (non-Catholic) Christians should care about Lent...

First, Steven Harmon:

In central Texas, where I grew up, the period between Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday made obvious the distinctions between how Catholics and Baptists practiced their faith.

Catholic friends came to school with ash smudges on their foreheads, ate a lot of fish, gave up various pleasures for a time, and went to extra church services. My Baptist friends and I did not. We wrongly considered this evidence that Catholics believed they had to do these things to be saved. We believed we were saved by grace and therefore didn't have to do any of that....

Can Baptists observe Lent? All Baptist congregations observe some sort of calendar in their worship. Though many Baptists may profess that they "judge all days to be alike," in reality they do "judge one day to be better than another" (Rom. 14:5), as many expect certain days and seasons of the year to be recognized in worship services....

Without the observance of Lent, and Holy Week in particular, Easter Sunday fails to keep in proper balance the Cross and the Resurrection as the two main New Testament paradigms for the Christian life....

Then Frederica Mathewes-Green:

Lent is a time of year to remember that God has seen fit to make us not airy spirits but embodied human beings living in a beautiful, material world....Spiritual disciplines such as fasting are analogous to weight-lifting equipment. One who uses them in a disciplined way will be stronger, not just when he's lifting weights, but also for every situation he meets.

While some people think of Lent as a time to personally choose something to "give up," the practice of the Eastern Christians, from the earliest centuries, is to observe a common fast. This is not a complete fast, but rather abstaining from meat and dairy—basically a vegan diet. Tertullian (A.D. 160-225) likened it to Daniel's diet in the king's court, when he abstained from meat and rich foods and grew stronger than those who feasted.

There's something to be said for following an ancient, universal Lenten custom like this instead of choosing your own adventure. Most of us are not capable of being our own spiritual directors....

In Lent we are one not only with the church through time, but also with those in our local church. Orthodox Lent begins with the Rite of Forgiveness, in which all church members form a circle and, one at a time, stand face-to-face with each other and ask forgiveness. This experience is profoundly healing and also preventive; I'm more likely to restrain a harsh word in July if I recall that I will have to ask this person's forgiveness again in March....

Then, Michael Horton:

Unlike the Old Testament, however, the New Testament does not prescribe a church calendar. Furthermore, Lent became associated in the medieval church with all sorts of rules and superstitions....

In my view, these special days are valuable chiefly as a teaching opportunity....an evangelical celebration of Lent affords an opportunity to reinforce rather than undermine the significance of Christ's person and work....

When unburdened by superstitious rites, Lent still holds tremendous promise if we will recover its evangelical purpose; namely, leading us and our children to Christ by his Word....

tents for Haiti

A nice, useful editorial from the C-J...

The world's reaction to the humanitarian disaster in Haiti following last month's earthquake has been swift and generous, but there is more to be done — especially as the Caribbean's rainy season approaches. The need for shelter among Haiti's survivors, 1.1 million of them homeless because of the quake, is at the heart of the tent drive coordinated by Louisville-based G.O. Ministries.

Already, the organization has seen to the delivery of 430,000 pounds of medicine, food, water and tents to the island nation and its people. The special drive for tents, now under way, came about because organizations on the ground in Haiti told G.O. Ministries that shelter is an especially pressing need....the organization's goal is to provide 1,000 new and/or gently used family-size and single tents to the people of Haiti in the very near future.

G.O. Ministries is accepting donations of tents from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday at their headquarters at 11501 Plantside Drive, Suite 14, Louisville, KY 40299. More information is available by calling (502) 493-9846 or by going to www.go-ministries.org....

that on-side kick was not risky-- according to the numbers

It was certainly risky in terms of what people would say.

But here are some interesting stats from Reed Albergotti in the WSJ...

New Orleans kicker Thomas Morstead squibbed the ball short in a surprise attempt at an onside kick and the ball was recovered by New Orleans....A day later, the trick play by coach Sean Payton was being touted as the gutsiest call in Super Bowl history.

But was it really that gutsy? The numbers say no. Statistically, the surprise onside kick works more often than not. Since 2000, onside kicks in the first three quarters—when they are typically unexpected—have been recovered by the kicking team almost 59% of the time. By contrast, 15% of fourth-quarter onside kicks were recovered in that same span.

In other words, it was more of a calculated risk than a gamble. A third-quarter onside kick is just a much more obvious risk than, say, blitzing a safety and a linebacker....

what says Happy Valentines's Day more than a big ol' pile of manure?

A farmer near Albert Lea, Minnesota created a one-half mile wide heart-- from manure-- for his wife of 37 years (hat tip: C-J)...

Pence supported Sodrel before-- and after-- it was "cool"

Mike Pence endorsed congressional candidate Mike Sodrel on Saturday. Sodrel will face Travis Hankins and Todd Young in May's Republican primary-- the winner of which is scheduled to face Rep. Baron Hill in November. I've already described this as a bizarre and disappointing decision by Pence.

Here are some excerpts from the press conference in Matt Koesters' Jeff/NA News-Tribune article...

Sodrel: “I can’t think of anyone that I would rather have an endorsement from than Congressman Mike Pence.”

Sodrel is correct here; buy low and sell high is good investment advice. And Pence is apparently just past the height of his endorsement powers among fiscal conservatives.

Pence: “[Sodrel is] someone who personifies all that’s best about...the conservative ideals that make this country great. I believe in Mike Sodrel. In fact, I was for Mike Sodrel before it was cool.”

Which "conservative ideals"? On social conservatism, it's certainly good news that Sodrel is "now fully on board" to defund Planned Parenthood from federal taxpayer dollars. Otherwise, Sodrel is quite solid. On fiscal conservatism, Sodrel has always talked a strong game-- and was surely a promising candidate when he ran in 2002 and won in 2004. But the record belies the rhetoric. Unless there has been a change of heart-- and I have not heard any sense of repentance-- than support for and an endorsement of is inconsistent with "(fiscally) conservative ideals".

So, Pence believes in Sodrel-- despite the evidence or because Pence's principles have faded. In a word, Pence was "for Mike Sodrel" before-- and now after-- "it was cool".